Duke Head Coach Mike KrzyzewskiOpening Statement:“We had a pretty distinguished guest in the locker room, so that was really good. Actually, everything today was really good, our team was outstanding and I thought NC State really came ready to play. I mean, they were outrebounding us 10-0 in the first five minutes. We were fortunate to start blocking out and rebounding; [Kyle] Washington came out with such a verve and we played hard. We played so hard today, and unselfishly. I thought Jabari [Parker] today was attacking, instead of shooting jump shots and it’s part of his process of growing as a player. Our defense was really good to force 21 turnovers and those turnovers, a lot of them were live turnovers, and they turned into high-percentage shots. Whether it be threes, open threes in transition, or whether we attack the basket, just a really good performance by my team. It’s a good build-up from beating Virginia. We got better this week. Hopefully we can continue to do that. We’re going to have to play that hard in order to have an opportunity to win in this league. But this afternoon was very good.”

On whether this was Duke’s best performance of the season:“Yeah, because I think State’s good. [T.J.] Warren’s so difficult to guard. [Anthony] Barber didn’t have the game he’s usually had, but for a freshman, he’s had an outstanding year. We just played good D today. I thought it’s the hardest that we’ve played. Again, we played really hard on Monday, collectively and our energies were combined these last two games and it started with defense. “

On if Quinn Cook’s defense on Anthony Barber set the tone for the team:“Well I thought Quinn [Cook] played outstanding defense. But you know, he has to have people behind him. I think that to single out one guy would not be the right thing today. Defensively, I thought we all played really well. The way they were scoring to begin with was on offensive rebounds. Jabari really stepped forward today. Part of this is a process of learning what we need to do at this level, and where you need to be an attacker, and he was today. He was an outstanding player today.”

On how they have focused on Jabari Parker’s learning process:“Changing habits is not easy, especially when you were so successful with other habits. It’s just a process. He and Jeff Capel worked really extra hard the past couple days, and I think motion helps him in that he gets the ball in different spots and then it’s up to him. Now you got it, do you attack or not attack? And today, he attacked and he got to the free throw line 10 times, and in the first four games, he got a total of 12. And it wasn’t because of bad calls, he wasn’t putting anybody in a position to call a foul. So he has to keep that attack mode there.”

On the impact of forcing turnovers:“Anytime you get a numerical advantage, it’s pretty good. When we had it, for us to share the ball when we had it, and take the best shot. We kind of blew it open there in the second half, we hit those threes. It started with good defense, either a turnover or a really good blockout. It led to us getting high percentage shots, and a number of guys did it. We had 10 guys in double-figure minutes and we stayed fresh, and it worked today. It was really good today. We’d like to play more guys, it’s something we’ve learned over the first ACC games that the conference games take even more of a toll on you, and since we’re not this rugged team, it probably takes a bigger toll earlier. We’re younger. One thing young players have to learn how to do is to be tired. Veteran players can be tired; you can be tired in a game and still function at a high level. That’s an amazing thing to learn. Older players usually know how to do that. There’s just more of a maturity there. We had, what, a 15-point lead, 37-22, it was close to the last TV timeout and we got tired. They scored six points and we had to call a timeout. That’s what I mean and we’re susceptible to that a lot for this team.”

On building on performances:“Yeah, we talked to them about it, look, we have confidence in you, the staff, the players. Rasheed [Sulaimon] kind of couldn’t be guarded there for about five minutes. We had a big lead but we scored every time because of how he handled the open set that we had. We’re more prone to having guys bad then good instead of always good. [Rodney] Hood is the closest to that because even if he’s not scoring points, he’s still playing well. Quinn should be able to do that. He did that today, even though he didn’t hit his shot like he can. It’s going to come, his shooting.”

On the honor of having President George H.W. Bush in attendance:“I would like to say that it was an amazing honor for us to have the 41st president of the United States here today. He does not travel anymore and over the last two decades, we have become very close friends in the fight against cancer. For him to honor us in this way was as big an honor as we could possibly have. I want to thank him publicly. We didn’t make it a public thing. For my team to have that experience with one of the great Americans in the history of our country. We’re talking about a guy who was the youngest fighter pilot in WWII, a pretty good baseball player, a guy who opened up the doors for us to have relations with China, a guy who led our country, was Commander in Chief, and privately over the last 15 years has started two organizations to fight cancer. The round table pin I wear all the time, and he was wearing this pin today. And 15 years ago, he started an organization called See Change, and it’s an organization to fight cancer. It helped all organizations, and he and Mrs. Bush were honorary chairs of it for 13 years, and two years ago he called to ask if I would be the honorary chair. For the last two years I’ve been the honorary chair of See Change. That’s why we have this kind of relationship you see today; there are people who are CEO’s and behind the scenes who are doing an amazing job in the fight against cancer, and for me in the last couple weeks, that fight has become much more personal. Anyway, I publicly want to thank President Bush for being here and he brought us good luck. I asked him what he was doing on Wednesday, if he wanted to come to Miami, but I don’t think he’s coming, so we’re going to have to do it on our own.”

Duke Freshman Jabari Parker“[Attacking] was kind of our plan. That’s what we shied away from for a couple of games, and I think we were a little bit conservative. I think I did a good job preparing this week to just do whatever I needed to do to help the team.”

On all the discussion in the media about his play recently:“I don’t always put them as a fuel for me because I never let the media get to me. I just have to play for the guys, and that’s all that matters for Duke – gotta play for them.”

On the difference for him between this game and previous ACC games:“I think [the keys were] my preparation and just my experience from the last couple of games. I just had to be a little bit more prepared, going in and avoid the [NC State] scouting report on what they want me to do rather than what I have to do. And that’s what I did today.”

When asked what the point of emphasis for Duke was after the Virginia game:“[The point of emphasis was] keeping the lead. I know that the second half was kind of similar to the Virginia game. We just had to pull away and keep on building the lead so they wouldn’t catch up.”

Duke Graduate Student Andre Dawkins“When we get going in Cameron and the crowd’s behind us, we just feel like everything’s going to go in. It eliminates tired for us on defense. Tired goes out the window because of the fans and your teammates are giving you all of that extra energy. It’s fun when we can do that.”

“When you’ve got guys fresh coming in and we’re keeping the pressure on them, it’s tough on the other team, especially when they’re not subbing that much.”

“Our bench has a lot of confidence right now. You’ve got Rasheed [Sulaimon], myself, Marshall [Plumlee], Josh [Hairston], guys coming in a playing hard and doing whatever we need to do, whether it’s getting rebounds or getting stops. Our bench is playing really well right now. We’ve just got to keep going.”

“At the beginning of the season, what we really worked on was pushing the tempo and pressing and getting a lot of possessions in a game. We kind of started to get back to that. It’s a work in progress right now because we’ve been away from that for so long, but we’ve just got to keep working at it and we’ll keep getting better at it.”

Duke Sophomore Amile Jefferson“I’m just trying to take advantage of the opportunities that I get. It was a fight. It was hard to get a rebound today, especially early, but I think all our guys got settled down and realized that we can’t just pursue the ball. We have to block out first. We have to tag and then pursue. When we started doing that, we really started being able to run offensively, get up and down the court, and make it a faster pace game. It was great for our guys to really be in there on the boards. We had a team rebounding effort tonight, and that really helped establish us offensively. We let our defense create our offense tonight and it really worked well for us.”

On NC State outrebounding Duke 13-0 to start the game:“It was tough. I think we went down 14-2, at one time, rebounding. It was because guys were going to the glass without boxing out. Coach [Mike Krzyzewski] was intense and we responded. Our guys responded. We started to block out, we started to push the ball, make their guys run, and we did a great job. We built a lead and we didn’t let up. That was great for us.”

“When you apply pressure, it can be a back-breaker. Scoring and then picking up, getting a steal, hitting a three, and then picking up again and getting a 10-second count or making them take a quick, bad shot. Those are plays that break teams, and our guys were able to do that. From our guards to our bigs, the five that were in to the five that came in when we hockey-subbed, it was great. Our guys did a great job of picking up the pressure, playing the fast tempo and really just fighting the whole time.”

NC State Head Coach Mark GottfriedOpening statement:“Well, I think number one, I thought today Duke was terrific. I think you’ve got to give them credit. I think the way Mike [Krzyzewski] used their depth and their pressure defense affected our inexperience and our short bench. I thought that was probably the biggest thing. We turned the ball over too many times. We’ve got to obviously be a lot stronger with the basketball, and they took turnovers and turned them into baskets, which was the biggest difference in the game. We have to learn how to handle pressure. Obviously with us right now, we’ve got eight scholarship guys, I thought they smelled blood in the water and they went after it. They did a nice job of keeping the heat on us all day.

On T.J. Warren:“I thought T.J. played hard, he competed really hard. They did a nice job of trying to keep fresh bodies on him all day and deny him the ball, and made it hard for him to catch it first prior to doing anything else. But I thought he really competed hard for his team.”

On defensive problems:“Well number one we’ve got to guard the ball better. I thought there were a number of times tonight they bounced it once, twice, three times and they eventually just got themselves past us. We’ve got to be able to defend better…You know Jordan [Vandenberg]’s not the most agile guy, and then BeeJay [Anya] isn’t either so when they’re involved in ball screens, it just makes the game really hard for us to defend. Those are areas we just have to keep improving on. We have to work on that and keep getting better at those things.”

On turnovers:“There wasn’t any question about it. I thought the turnovers, I thought the fact that they turned most of the turnovers into points was a difference in the game. I think in the first half, if you look at it, I think they had 16 baskets we had 14, but a number of those were threes and most of those were off of turnovers, our turnovers. But that was the name of the game: their defensive pressure and we did not handle it nearly as well as we should.”

On what Duke did offensively to cause defensive lapses:“Well I think when you don’t guard the ball very well and Duke does a great job with their dribble penetration, you come off somebody to help, you’re leaving someone on the perimeter that’s a pretty good shooter. They took advantage of that today. Their dribble penetration led to the three. Obviously they made a lot of them, they knocked them down. It started for us with our inability to defend somebody off the dribble. That hurts.”

On whether the freshmen were intimidated playing in Cameron:“I don’t think it’s intimidation at all. Like I said when I started, their depth, he did a nice job. Mike [Krzyzewski] right now is playing more guys and they’ve got fresh bodies on the floor. I think they took advantage of us with their depth and their defensive ball pressure. They did a great job with those obviously using their depth and pressuring the ball all night.”